Aircraft ＂Doctor＂ Wu Zhiju and his aviation dream team

Wu Zhiju (right)

CCTV News:In the first China Civil Aviation Maintenance Job Vocational Skills Competition, the three teams of China Eastern Airlines won the top three in terms of group total score and individual synthesis. As one of the team leaders and coaches, Wu Zhiju was proud of his team. Behind the honor and aura is the hard work of the whole team, and Wu Zhiju’s unremitting efforts.

Study hard and sharpen a sword in twenty years.

In 1996, Wu Zhiju, who liked big planes since he was a child, was admitted to civil aviation university of china. During his four years of university and three years of postgraduate life, he studied hard, focusing on the material research of aircraft structure, which laid a good foundation for aircraft maintenance after joining China Eastern Airlines.

After graduation, he came to China Eastern Airlines for 14 years, and he never stopped learning. With the continuous introduction of aircraft from China Eastern Airlines fleet, Wu Zhiju insisted on learning English and business skills, and constantly improved his skill level by studying manuals such as SRM, AMM, SDS, FIM and WDM, so as to understand the characteristics of aircraft selection. He believes that only by continuous learning can we keep up with the times and make a qualitative leap in our work.

This spirit of hard study has made Wu Zhiju’s technical level constantly change with the development of science and technology, and he has never fallen behind. Since joining the civil aviation work, he has participated in the formulation of the 8C inspection structure repair scheme for 2809, 2810 and 2843 aircraft, prepared the cabin renovation workshop, established the replacement ability of the cabin side wall wallpaper, and formulated a series of work items such as the workflow of domestic cabin PMA parts. In addition, he also led the establishment of the 737 aircraft overhaul capability, from the initial scheme formulation and demonstration to the scheme approval, to the preparation of tooling equipment and personnel qualifications in the early stage, and the smooth implementation, Wu Zhiju participated in and led the whole process.

From a mechanic to the director of the structural workshop of the inspection department, Wu Zhiju became an important technical "big coffee" in the Hongqiao maintenance base of China Eastern Airlines Technology Company. In 2015, Wu Zhiju was awarded as the chief technician of China Eastern Airlines; In 2016, Wu Zhiju won the Shanghai May 1st Labor Medal; In 2017, as one of the leaders of the three representative teams of China Eastern Airlines, he led the technical "Dream Team" of China Eastern Airlines to stand out from 63 airlines and 78 participating teams nationwide, and won the top three in the collective and the top three in the individual in the "First China Civil Aviation Maintenance Job Vocational Skills Competition" with excellent results, thus achieving a grand slam.

Persist in innovation and make development sustainable.

Wu Zhiju always believes that only innovation can produce more economic benefits. Therefore, with the permission of airworthiness laws and regulations, Wu Zhiju continued to study innovative projects through going abroad, introducing specialized training, preliminary experiments and concrete implementation, and improving process methods.

In 2014, Wu Zhiju led the research and development of the A330 aircraft self-repair project. Wu Zhiju strives for perfection in all stages of the project evaluation, preparation, implementation and review. He creatively puts forward two new technologies, namely "a new method for accurate positioning of multi-curved carbon fiber composite structural parts" and "an optimized curve for bonding and curing of new materials", by using his solid theoretical foundation and rich work experience and combining the latest international structural repair technologies, especially for structural repair of new materials such as composite materials. It solved the biggest problem in the implementation of the project, made the project a great success, and won the unanimous approval of the judges in the "2014 Annual Innovation Collection Activity" competition of China Eastern Airlines, and was awarded the first prize. Since the implementation of the project for two years, 14 sets have been repaired, saving the direct maintenance cost of 4.508 million yuan for the company, reducing the spare parts of A330 thrust reverser, prolonging the service life of thrust reverser in the wing and reducing the maintenance rate of aircraft thrust reverser. At present, the innovative technology of "A new method for accurate positioning of multi-curved carbon fiber composite structural parts" is applying for a patent for utility model.

At present, Wu Zhiju has set up several innovative project teams in the structural workshop of the regular inspection branch of Hongqiao Maintenance Base where he works. These projects have greatly promoted the company to reduce costs and increase efficiency, and become a new performance growth point after the company’s "marketization, industrialization, specialization and internationalization" transformation.

Focus on inheritance and promote the continuous development of skills.

In the eyes of colleagues, Wu Zhiju is always ready to help others, never sparing his superb skills, and always gives everything to others without reservation. Every year, he takes the initiative to undertake the pre-job training task for new employees, and has trained many excellent structural repair talents through "teaching, passing on, helping and bringing".

Over the years, Wu Zhiju has taken eight apprentices, including Wu Chunchen, Gao Song, Jin Xiaoliang and Hou Liming. Each apprentice is engaged in aircraft structural repair, and is the backbone of the workshop team, with outstanding performance, and often participates in major aircraft maintenance and troubleshooting work. Now, his new target is a group of new technicians with a working experience of about three years. These young people have a certain degree of work experience, which is the golden age of rapid skill improvement. As the leader of professional skills, Wu Zhiju consciously has the responsibility to bring this batch of new colleagues well.

Turning to Wu Zhiju’s thick work log, the title page reads: "It is the wish of our crew to make all planes fly safely and normally, and it is also the goal we are working tirelessly for." This is Wu Zhiju’s belief and a true portrayal of his work. He is silently interpreting this sentence with practical actions and making his own contribution to the development of civil aviation without regrets. (Source: China Eastern Airlines Group)